was up at my lot yesterday and checked out the house across the street they are building. The gas pipe they had going into the metr on the gas company’s side was 1 inch then the regulator then meter bracket the meter was not in yet. The pipe out of the meter was1″ then increased to 1 1/2″ is there any advantage to this. They are putting in two furnaces one in the garage one up in the atticb not two big a house probably 3000 sf gas water heater or two gas cook top one gas fireplace.
How does increasing the pipe size help? The 1″ pipe is suppling that the regulator is controling the preasure so what does going to 1 1/2″ do except increase the bill?
Replies
Wally, the supply side is going to be around 30psi and the load side around 5psi. (Don't quote my #'s, as it's been a long time since I heard them myself.) So you can see where they would need a larger pipe to flow enough to provide the 4 heavy loads and the cooktop.
SamT
Hi Sam I think you mean 30 inches of water column and 5 inches of wc If you have those numbers as psi then your flames must be 10 feet high on the gas stove!!! <g> ie 28 " wc = 1psi
I do believe your right.
Did I get the 30 & 5 right? It's only been 10 or 15 years and I've got real short term memory loss issues to say nothing of long term...;>
SamT (I think, let me check...Yeah, that's right.)
It's CRS. Can't Remember.... What was the rest of it? Comes hand in hand with the ageing process.
Around here it's more like 40 PSI ahead of the regulator, and 0.3 PSI in the house. See Taunton's "Code Check: Plumbing" book for a concise treatment of how to size gas lines.
-- J.S.
Large requirements (or a long distance to appliance) at low pressure means a bigger pipe. When I ran a line to my shop ( over 600ft) I had to use a 1 1/2" pipe. The pressure regulator at the meter makes sure that the low pressure side is always at that pressure, no matter how much gas is being used, so if you have a lot of demand, or a long way to go you use larger pipe to make sure you have the volume to draw from.
And believe me, 600ft of 1 1/2" gas line isn't cheap.
Robert